Laboratory Auditing Qualifications and Scope
Environmental Standards’ dedicated Quality Assurance Chemists have performed hundreds of laboratory audits nationwide at the request of industry, law firms, engineering firms, and even the laboratories themselves to enable them to meet their internal quality assurance/quality control requirements. Our laboratory audits are extremely rigorous and significantly exceed regulatory-based and ISO Standard 17025 requirements. Further, while audits required under the National Environmental Laboratory Accreditation Program (NELAP) are necessary for NELAP accreditation, the extent and frequency of the NELAP-based audits are not sufficient to assess project work liabilities that may arise in a particular program or for a specific CAA, NPDES, RCRA or CERCLA project. When conducting laboratory audits, Environmental Standards’ Quality Assurance Chemists evaluate laboratory performance relative to client expectations, liabilities, and company policy, and then mandate and track the appropriate corrective actions.
An Environmental Standards laboratory audit consists of examining and assessing the following areas of laboratory operations:
- Facilities and equipment
- Organization and personnel qualifications
- Written analytical and non-analytical SOPs and QA plans
- Sample administration area and the procedures for entering sample information into the laboratory information management system (LIMS)
- Sample storage areas
- Sample preparation areas/procedures
- QA/QC Department
- Organic and inorganic instrumentation and wet chemistry areas
- Data reduction and data package preparation
- Data storage areas (hardcopy and electronic)
- Client services and data inquiry services
Environmental Standards has conducted on-site audits of hundreds of domestic (including facilities in Alaska, Hawaii and Puerto Rico) and international laboratories (including facilities in Argentina, Australia, Belgium, Canada, France, Germany, Hungary, Indonesia, Malaysia, Mexico, Norway, South Korea and the United Kingdom). International audits require a high level of expertise to evaluate good analytical practices effectively because many foreign countries do not standardize regulatory methods.